TRANSCRIPT:
I’m Mark Rapp, and this is Rapp on Jazz.
Jazz helped reshape the visual arts. Artists like Romare Bearden and Jackson Pollock translated jazz's energy, rhythm, and improvisation onto canvas.
Bearden’s collages often depict scenes of African American life, bursting with color, movement, and layered textures that echo the syncopation and call-and-response of jazz ensembles.
Each figure, shape, and pattern seems to swing in harmony, creating a visual rhythm that feels alive.
Jackson Pollock, though abstract, also captured jazz’s improvisational spirit. His drip paintings resemble musical solos on canvas: spontaneous, energetic, and full of tension and release.
As a jazz musician builds on a melody in real time, Pollock’s hand moves with freedom and intuition, producing compositions that pulse with life.
Through these artists, jazz becomes color, form, and motion, reminding us that music’s creative spirit transcends every medium.
This has been Rapp on Jazz, a co-production of ColaJazz and South Carolina Public Radio, made possible by the ETV Endowment of South Carolina.